One time, after I had gotten myself rather too deeply in the mining game for comfort, Mr. Henry told me that he also had, some years earlier, taken a flyer in mining with his old partner, Seth Handley, at Grass Valley, California. But when the conversation was terminated, I was of the opinion that he had, in fact, only put his sweetheart on ice, so to speak, for safe keeping against the time when the family winds might blow less raw. And had the Aristocratic Augusta Ann have passed on before the girl I think Mr. Henry, divorcee or no, would have cast his religion to the winds—as did The King.
Somehow, I don’t like the divorce angle.
Seth Handley’s sister died at the little mining town of Grass Valley, in California, where her brother was a prospector. Mr. Henry went to Omaha to meet the Union Pacific train bearing his old partner, Seth, and the remains on the way back east for burial. On his return home, Mr. Henry was visibly shaken. It was a sad day for him. Few people here ever knew just who it was that held such a strangle hold on Mr. Henry’s affections.
From my early association with Mr. Henry and Seth I got the impression that there was more between them than just being partners. Later, I had it from one or the other of them, maybe both, that the girl in the case was Seth’s sister. Their implement house and yard was just across the street from our home, down by the tracks, on “Smoky Row.” And though less than half their age, my mother said I was always under foot when they wanted to go about their work. The year was 1872. But if I were not under foot at the moment when Seth wanted to go hunting, he would come to the house and ask me to go along. He would shoot anything that could fly. And Seth remembered, years later. He sent his respects to me from Omaha by Mr. Henry. At that time I was “helping out” in the DeForest general store.
I suspect there were some things the aristocratic Augusta Ann did not know about her favorite son. While vacationing in Colorado Mr. Henry, with the Handley girl—who was supposed to be in California—rode horses on the trail to the top of Pike’s Peak. Miss Handley rode a sidesaddle, the ancient kind where the lady puts her left foot in the stirrup and throws her right leg over the left fork of the split pommel—and holds on for dear life. That was at a time when it was considered vulgar for a lady to straddle a horse. Also it was before the cog-railroad mounted the Peak, even before the time of the carriage road up the north side of the mountain.
Mr. Henry’s eyes sparkled when he told me it was a wonderful trip—one I should not miss—and though a little difficult coming down, especially for the ladies, he said he enjoyed it immensely. That was quite understandable. Love had come to Mr. Henry wrapped in trouble. Here now for a day at least he was bound by no thongs. Here, with the girl who was the most precious one in the world to him, his spirits could soar—unhampered, up to the clouds.
Under Mr. Henry’s oral guidance, I also made that trip all by my lonesome—that is, without my girl. Later, I went to the top again with THE Girl, and I can tell you there was a difference. We were in love, a maid and a man—intoxicated with the joy that only the first love of the young knows. And the clouds came down to where one could almost reach up and touch them—just as Mr. Henry had said they would.
I have learned, as doubtless Mr. Henry had learned, that the show spots in this old world of ours take on beauty and meaning when you have someone along—preferably THE ONE—to help you enjoy them. It’s truly a situation where two hearts can beat as one. And it’s worth a million to see the shine come into her eyes.
Might say here that it was while on an editorial junket to Colorado Springs—with THE Girl—that I made this great discovery. It was her first trip to the mountains, and the shine was in her eyes—big. I’m glad that memory holds the picture of the girl, who, in all her radiant loveliness, walked by my side all through that week with but one tiny shadow to flit across her faultless blue sky.
And while she had, with justification, came near showing temper one morning, when, in following the crowd, I had innocently led her away from the historic grave of Helen Hunt-Jackson, on the mountain above the Seven Falls, down the gravel slide, thereby ruining a pair of new shoes for her, she was still THE Girl that made all the difference. Compared with some of the other women who took the plunge, her squawk was mild indeed—and most ladylike. The well-dressed women in that day wore high kid shoes and silk stockings.